The court-appointed receiver in charge of California prison medical care said a report criticizing the quality of inmate treatment is outdated and does not reflect recent improvements.

The state Office of the Inspector General reported last week that just nine of the 33 adult prisons met minimum health care standards, even after taxpayers spent billions of dollars to improve treatment.

In that report, the score for the California Institution for Men in Chino had surpassed standards, but first-round evaluations of the California Institution for Women in Chino and the California Rehabilitation Center in Norco found that those prisons had not met minimum adherence levels.

Receiver J. Clark Kelso said the report should have noted that a second round of inspections at five of the 33 prisons this year, including CIW and CRC, showed that care was improving.

Kelso said he is confident that more than two-thirds of the state’s 33 prisons will cross the threshold of having met minimum health care standards by 2012.

“The information that we’re now getting on the second round of inspections provides, I think, a much more accurate picture of where we currently are,” he said.

“Suffice to say, things are changing and improving pretty quickly.”

The inspector general’s scores measure how well each prison complies with the Department of Corrections’ policies and procedures for health care.

“They’re doing pretty well and I would expect they are likely to improve,” Kelso said of CIM. “They’re already at moderate adherence.”

Kelso said the medical staffing at CIM is better than others because of its location.

“It’s fairly easy for us to recruit there, and we haven’t had a serious problem of getting nurses and doctors,” Kelso said.

“There’s much more stability in the work force and not as much turnover. We’re not dealing with large numbers of vacancies. Prisons in the middle of the state and the desert are harder to recruit physicians. CIM has not had those problems.”

CIW and Norco’s drug rehab institution had also crossed the minimum threshold.

“CIW was at 69.6 percent, which is low adherence, but now it’s up to 77.5 percent, which is a 7.9 percent increase, so they improved quite a bit,” Kelso said.

Another second-round improvement was found at the Norco prison. The improvement, from 74.3 percent to 75.9 percent was slight, but receivership officials said overcrowding at the prison has hindered health care improvement there.

The inspector general is tracking prison medical care at the receiver’s request, using criteria established by the receiver.

The first full review was completed toward the end of 2010.

“I wouldn’t say it’s an outdated snapshot,” said Renee Hansen, spokeswoman for the Inspector General’s Office. “It’s a compilation of the first 33 reports, and we have released five since.

“We do agree there have been improvements for the most part – some smaller, some larger.”

The receiver was appointed by the federal courts and took control of the prison medical system in 2006 after the quality of care was determined to be unconstitutional.

Since then, spending on inmate health care more than doubled, from $707 million to $1.5 billion last year. However, Kelso said this year’s budget will be reduced by $144 million.

Kelso agreed with the inspector general’s conclusion that prisons do a particularly poor job of making sure inmates receive medications and prompt medical care.

Kelso blamed prison overcrowding that he said can only be improved with a substantial decrease in the number of inmates. He backed Gov. Jerry Brown’s plan to transfer jurisdiction over thousands of felons to local sheriffs and jails.

He also supported a federal court ruling that would require California to sharply reduce its prison population as the only way to improve the care of physically and mentally ill inmates.

Neil Nisperos has been a reporter covering everything from business to education, courts, politics, city government, features, arts and entertainment since 1999. On social media, he has a combined following of about 25,300 people over various apps and platforms. He's passionate about the cinema, science, philosophy, poetry, art, photography, culture, literature and history. He feels fortunate to be in the profession that keeps power in check, memorializes people's stories for posterity and helps people with useful information.

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